


The Yoso's Medallions

by Criistina_rb



Category: Original Work
Genre: Fantasy, Multi, original - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:15:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22283968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Criistina_rb/pseuds/Criistina_rb
Summary: Synopsis: Listening to bedtime stories is the bridge for imagination to flourish, thus creating magical or tragic dreams. Caesar knows this, as a child he had the unfortunate experience of hearing a legend about three medallions capable of reviving the most powerful mages at night, causing so many deaths that he slept for days.A few years have passed and Caesar leads a quiet life with his friends. But a disappearance made her tranquility fall as fast as the events that followed.Strange deaths and nightly attacks swept the newspapers, terrifying and endangering anyone who dared to go out at night. Caesar knows this when he decided to take a risk and open the gate, just not knowing that he knows the cause of those deaths so well, just remember that





	The Yoso's Medallions

Finally the clock read six o’clock. On a normal day, I’d be waking up just now, but today wasn’t just any day. Forty-five minutes listening to the ticking of the clock like a lullaby. Five times I’ve almost dozed off, but the whimpers of my kitten, Maya, who I had adopted at ten, always took me from the last moments before erasing. And my grandmother was still in the kitchen.  
I know this because from my room I still heard the rosary on television and now and then she beating her spoon on the edge of the pan to get the excess food out.  
I had already counted how many books were on the shelves scattered around my room, on the computer in front of me, and on the wall beside me. He had concluded that he had too many books without reading and would not buy others until they were finished. The map above my headboard, glued to the wall, had eighteen red dots in places I had never visited, served only as ornaments, and from the balcony door of my room I could see the sad flowers our neighbor had given years ago. I had forgotten to water yesterday and my grandmother would kill me if I forgot today.  
When the clock struck an hour since I woke up and I had bitten all my tongue with nervousness, the creak of the defective stair step from when my grandfather had dropped my old moving bed, announced that my grandmother was doing the opposite of her. I wanted. I closed my eyes seconds before she opened the door.  
“Caesar?” She muttered. I felt his eyes on me and struggled to remain still. “Is sleeping?”  
Maya meowed twice, trying to warn of my lie and felt the weight of her paw on my face.  
“Hey, let him sleep, Ma.” By his movement she was taking her paw off, I tensed because I felt my eyes tremble.  
Despite the insistent meowing, I heard her walk to the door, closing, and soon after the noisy stairs, only then I opened my eyes.  
“You almost blew it, miss,” he said, making an angry face that soon fell apart when she was on her back.  
I waited while I patted her belly, which was almost ironic if I stopped to think about the first year she came home and the amount of bites I took when I tried to get closer, but my grandparents said that “she lacked love” and That’s why I insisted. To this day I had the mark of one such attempt on my left cheek. The good part was that his black fur warmed my cold hand and served as a soothing. In the room, parts of rambling words showed that the priest was saying goodbye. Again the defective step signaled that my grandmother was climbing, and I closed my eyes in time.  
As with every year, she opened the door to close shortly thereafter, checking, hoping I would go with her.  
" I’ll be right back, Maya.”  
Deep down, I think I knew my sleep was more fake than all the trips marked on the map behind my bed.  
I waited two minutes after the kitchen door closed before leaving my bed, the room temperature had dropped dramatically as soon as I stepped on the floor. It was now or never. I ran down the stairs to check if she had left. On television, which she had forgotten to turn off, the mass she always attended began, but today she would not watch here, had personally gone to church, her main purpose was the cemetery. This I did not like, I really tried in the first years after my father died. I went every time he completed a death anniversary, I don’t know if that is the correct word, but the point is that in sixth grade I saw no reason for that anymore.  
Not when I knew why my father died and I began to understand what was going on. It was not easy to hear about how life is fleeting and that the certainty we have was only death when I knew it could have been avoided. Seeing his grave then was awesome. That’s because, one night, when all seemed well, my mother left.  
I was seven at the time, months before my birthday, my parents who never fought, fought very often. It started with routine discussions about the teacher who would not teach me, so she would have to change her plans, or how the food was unsalted. There was always a reason, she always found a reason, and it seems that my very calm father only made it worse. I remember hearing at my bedroom door, which had become customary, when the most serious fight began.  
“You need to understand that things are not so, just tell me what is happening so I can help you! My father said and now I realized how pleading his voice sounded.”  
“You can not! You are a weak man who cannot take care of a family. You can’t get a job, you know you’re a terrible photographer! Look for a real job. We will go hungry and I don’t want to be here when this happens!”  
I didn’t dare open the door to peek through the crack, but I was sure they were on either side of the kitchen table, as at other times, as if to protect each other. But that day there was something different, my mother had the suitcase ready.  
“With your job, we’re getting through it. You can’t go out like this, we have a son.”  
“As if that were just that, John! We would live only for one child, you know I don’t love you anymore.”  
“We can solve that. I don’t know what happened after the trip, but we can solve it.”  
“You do not listen to me?” She screamed again, and I needed to bite my lip hard, my mother was not like that “I do not want you anymore, you want to know what happened? Would you like? I found someone else, a much better person than you.”  
It was silent for a while, though I could hear my heartbeat easily. She must have been reconsidering, realizing how heavy her words had been, and that my father was trying to get a job, had given up on being a photographer. A noise revealed that the kitchen door was opened.  
“As for Caesar. Her voice was steady, with no trace of trembling” I’ll send him some money every month.  
“You can’t do that…”  
“Just let me go.”  
And she went, I ran to my bedroom window, because I didn’t believe this was happening and I arrived in time to see her running toward the gate, as if her life depended on it. I didn’t see her anymore.  
My father was heartbroken and for spending most of his day looking for a job, left me at my grandparents’ house. Only at night did I see him, always with that undead face I saw in the drawings. No one ever told me what happened, everyone pretended that my mom had just gone traveling, like the last time, the time she’d made her fight with my dad.  
I, innocently, almost like a ritual, every day after school sat by my bedroom window, the same one I saw my mother leave, believing that she would appear soon after, ignoring everything I had heard. But day after day my hope was dying, I heard a month after she left that no money had appeared. My father was worried about her, even after he knew she was already with another. It was the first night I slept at my grandparents’ house, according to them my father had started work, but I knew he went looking for her, the woman who had abandoned us and that he still loved.  
It’s easy to imagine what happened, my father didn’t come back either. But he didn’t abandon me, no, my grandmother made it clear to me, not like my mother, he was now at peace.  
The reason I learned soon after, from my aunts during the wake, he had had a motorcycle accident, “the poor guy went after the woman who left him, look what happened.” I heard that a lot, it’s one of the most recurring memories of my childhood.  
My grandmother has been my guide here and I owe her a lot, it must have been hard for her to go through what she went through and keep smiling while the memory of her son was in the little boy she needed to take care of.  
I climbed the stairs back a little hurriedly, not sure how much time I had before she arrived and needed that time for me. Upstairs, which my grandfather had done after I came to live with them, had four bedrooms. When I was a child I had named them, room number one was what I slept on; number two, which my friends used to sleep when they came, or my cousin, was the visitor; number four was an abandoned one that my grandmother always kept locked, don’t ask me what’s in there, I’ve tried in vain to find out; the three was what i would come in now.  
“OK, let’s go.”  
After breathing twice, I entered the room, right in front of mine and watched him carefully. It was not often opened often, so the muffled smell was the first thing I felt before looking at my grandfather’s photograph on the white desk on the front wall. He was smiling on my birthday, my father who had taken this picture and it was torn in half because by his side must be my mother. I move closer to the desk and open the first drawer, were all the photos my grandmother kept in her memory, in one of them a small baby and two seventeen year olds holding it, these were the only photos we still had of my mother . Her long wavy hair and almond-shaped eyes were just there just to cut them out. I could not feel anything.  
Below were the photos of my young grandfather at their wedding. Unfortunately, he had left us about five years ago. But I can, unlike my father, remember his quiet death, almost feeling a peace. She could tell that his time had really come, he died in his sleep. I had not suffered, and it made me happy. Without him my grandmother would not have been able to move on, so thank you for staying until when everyone was over, I know it wasn’t easy.  
“I miss you,” I muttered, running my fingers over his face. I only realized that I had spoken loudly when Maya appeared at the curious door.  
But I didn’t want to pay attention to that alone, it was time to remember them, not their death, but their life, and there were still many things to look at. I looked around the room, at the other end for boxes on the floor where I kept drawings of mine or gadgets from when I was a child, my grandmother kept them all. But what really caught my attention was the bookcase next door, there were all the books my dad used to read. I opened it carefully and let myself smile for the first time I entered the room. One thing my grandparents did to give new spirits and not let me be sad was to read bedtime stories for me every day.  
The first book, although stored was full of dust, were the most classic tales. I already knew them, but my grandfather’s rehearsals gave them a whole new look, and what I remember most to this day was Mommy Paw’s shrill voice from the story of the ugly duckling.  
“This ugly duckling can’t be mine!” He said, using the most alarming tone possible.  
It took me a while to look at the pictures, they were beautiful. The book next to him piled up had coffee stains, the day I unintentionally dropped my grandmother’s cup, it was the first of adventure, it told about a boy my age so it was very easy to get inspired by it. , who braved the sea looking for hidden treasure.  
“There is a treasure, my noble boy, that destroys everything where it passes. He can not fall into the wrong hands” - I read the first sentence of a random page I found. It had been a good story.  
The other book was the oldest, if I had no memory, my maternal grandmother who had given me on one of her visits was a collection of short stories. My grandparents read almost all of them and going through the pages I found one that wasn’t so cool about a curse that involved reborn wizards and charms.  
“The face of a beautiful young woman appeared, Zaphie and there the deaths began.”  
Okay, that’s what no doubt scared me the most. The following was about time travel with specific pieces, an adventure of three friends looking for them. So my dreams were relatively different, some hours were too happy, others a little worrying, as when she read about the deaths in these tales.  
Two tears fell when I saw the photo album my father photographed next to them, in them were his essence, whether it was the butterfly he found during his travels, the angle he took the picture of a flower and how detailed he was with everything. that. In them were his passion.  
It was at these times that I reserved to remember how important my grandfather and father were in childhood. And how my life had changed because of my mother.  
“Caesar! Already awake?”  
I freaked out, knocking over the album she held, which must have been enough for her to know that I was in this room.  
“Yes, I’ll be right down.”  
I took a deep breath and wiped my runny nose, walked down the bedroom corridor, and headed for the stairs. Even before reaching the bottom of the stairs, Maya appeared, stretching and waiting for me at the end.  
“Hi, you slept a lot, huh? He said in the thin voice I always assume.”  
I took a few more steps past the living room where the television was and reached the kitchen doorway, my grandmother on her back, her dark brown hair pinned to her bun, holding the teacup in her hand with the scars of burns. I avoided looking at her red eyes as she turned. Despite her age, she was a woman of few wrinkles, very beautiful.  
“Did you sleep well, dear?” She asked cautiously.  
She must have noticed that my eyes were red too.  
“Yeah. Maya woke me up.“I know she knew it was a lie, but I couldn’t help it.  
“I asked her not to do that.” She almost smiled “will your friends come?”  
“Yes, I’m waiting for them.”  
That said, she turned her attention to the dirty dishes. From there she tried to talk about my maternal grandparents, who lived in her home country of Spain, but the matter went away faster than it had come so embarrassingly quiet. Not that I didn’t like them, far from it, they were not to blame, it just wasn’t the day.  
“Yeah, well ... So ... did you write something this week?” I asked, running my hand through my hair.  
After retiring from the Journalism Writing department, my grandmother found another passion: writing poems and short stories, she didn’t intend to publish, as she “was too old,” but it was really charming how she used the words. In addition, it served as an escape for a moment of silence.  
When she nodded, I saw the opportunity to change the subject and ran to the living room next to the kitchen where the notebook she wrote her texts was on. She was waiting for me with a slight smile on her face and I was relieved that the weather was calm.  
“There are bitter pains that sour the soul, other cruel ones that pierce it, but there is also  
The perfect blend of the two. What I feel like ... ”  
I gasped and in front of me she was paralyzed, as if I’d spoken her biggest sin. It must have been the text she wrote for today, by the date it had above the title “Dear John.” I started flipping through the pages looking for something not so recent as she cleared the plates in a hurry. My throat was dry when I read another text again.  
“Sitting here, I watch the blue ...”  
I heard the gate open and let out the air I didn’t know I was holding. I turned my face in time to see two heads appear in the kitchen door, with the best smiles, Hector and Rafael. My best friends since I moved to town with my parents, just before the breakup, since I’m about seven years old, if I wasn’t mistaken. Rafael, the boy with the biggest smile, was what brought the four of us together, with his ability to have different moods for each type of person, pulling us into conversation when we were just classmates, introducing his cousin who looked nothing like him. he, Hector. Hector was more like me, except for his straight black hair and for having much more interesting things to convey, whether it was about healthy eating or caring for the animals. If Rafa was the soul of our quartet, he was the tranquility. Which only reminded me of Yin Yang, a tattoo I knew my father had.  
“Mrs. Sara! Every day more beautiful” said, already opening the door.  
With his hand in the air for just a second, his gaze lingered on my grandmother’s lack of a smile and the redness was probably on my face and seemed to remember something. We never looked like this except that day and he knew what day it was. I could see on his black skin, a flush spread, though simple and for a moment it seemed as if he would withdraw his hand.  
“You want food, don’t you?” Finally answered with the best smile, but his gaze was fixed on me, watching me go to the room to save the notebook. Rafael smiled again.  
" I can not resist. Just don’t tell my mom.”  
“That you prefer my food to hers?” My grandmother muttered, secretly, still laughing. “Leave it to me.”  
“You’re an angel,” he said before going to the stove and stuffing a tapioca.  
If it had been two years ago, Rafa would have stuffed two and still taken a bite of mine, but two years ago he decided that he needed to lose weight after being ill at school, and now that he had the weight he wanted and the exams up to date, no longer wishing to stop, had a taste for exercise, and avoided foods that were bad and sugar-laden as much as possible, Hector was helping him with that, since his was by far the best food in the group.  
“Now that you have settled your case,” Hector said with a smile watching Rafael eat. “Let’s go?”  
“Yes. And the moon?”  
“She’ll meet us up front.”  
I said good-bye to my grandmother and hurried up the stairs to get my black bicycle, my age-old companion, who was in my room, one hand on the handlebars and one with the tapioca as they took the bikes propped up against the wall and followed us. to the gate.  
“Did you do Carlos’ work to deliver tomorrow?” Rafa asked me, referring to a job I had no idea.  
“Carlos spent work?”  
“In a pair, it was your turn to do it,” he said, grimacing.  
Rafael and I, studying in the same room, did almost everything together. To save time both of us, who were also a couple in freelance work involving computers and cell phones, from formatting to website creation, an area we wanted to study in a future college, which just thinking made me nervous, we took turns doing the work. that they were doubles, to leave a free and according to my dear friend, it was my turn.  
“Gosh, I was studying for the exam.”  
“What proof?”  
“His, for tomorrow too,” he said, watching Rafa’s face turn pale.  
“I didn’t mean anything, but you’re screwed.” Hector shrugged, making us look at him. “And I’ll be busy.”  
“Just a little,” Rafa moaned. “must have a free time.”  
“You know I won’t change plans.”  
Hector would be busy, he had a specific routine, and he liked to follow it. Which meant he couldn’t give us that extra helping hand now and then, since despite studying in another room, he had the same deadlines as us and a much better plan.  
“Goodbye today’s game,” Rafa murmured, remembering our departures before bed.  
He continued talking to Hector, looking for ways for him to release even if it was an hour to study with him as we walked, but I didn’t look at them. His throat was dry and his hands were sweating, because at the end of the street, the last member of our quartet, who had been a part of him since we were eight years old, was undoubtedly Luana. He had blue eyes that could make any storm pass, and little freckles on his cheeks and nose.  
" Caesar? Hey! “ Hector nudged me, making me jump. “What do you think?”  
" About what?”  
They followed my stunned gaze and also spotted Luana, and soon after, with a wrinkled forehead, faced each other. But what?  
“Boys!”  
She got off the bike, just as we were, and walked the last few feet as she tied her long black hair with her rainbow clip. When she hugged me, right after the other two, my lips tightened and I think they froze there with a smile from ear to ear. My two friends were still looking at me as I futilely tried to get serious, but I didn’t even know what was happening to me these days.  
" Rafa told a joke, was it?” She poked my arm and turned to him. “What’s up?”  
" What?”  
“Don’t tell me that was the parrot’s,” she grimaced, smiling.  
“Why?”  
“Your face. Wasn’t it a joke?”  
I was still looking at her with a silly face and undid the exaggerated smile.  
“It was nothing.”  
“Dona Suzana sent you this,” she said, drawing her attention away from me, handing Hector a bag, “said it was important.”  
Hector looked through the gap in the bag, only to confirm what was inside and reached for Rafael.  
“Just don’t miss it.”  
It was the book he had borrowed, like many others. Hector who had encouraged the reading habit in Rafael, who had no books until that day, so we would alternate to lend books to him. I even had four books of my own there at his house, Hector so, it should have twice as many. According to Rafa, “reading multiple books simultaneously was much better than reading one at a time,” but we knew it was because he was trying to “save” his troubled neighbor, Ben, by reading. Although we didn’t think it would work, we were keen to help you with that.  
“Of course I won’t lose,” he said a little offended. “When did I do that?”  
It only took a glance for Rafael to remember that he had already done that and much worse when the book arrived with blood marks and we knew they were from Ben.  
After ten minutes, at a slow speed, taking advantage of the sun that was already strong early, we arrived at the place we usually go when we have vacant class or when we were silly, Tadeu’s cafeteria. Tadeu was our trainee geography teacher in the first year of high school, who had only finished college, because after teaching a class as complicated as ours, gave up the idea, I admit that he really had no way. He created this diner soon after, and became our favorite place.  
The predominant colors on the façade were pink, brown, and cream, Luana’s idea for ice cream, and it was all created by her too, who was just now beginning to make sure she chose something related to college art. We went inside the glass door and the first thing we did was go to the little room next to the entrance where Thaddaus let us keep our bikes after Luana’s was stolen even with the chain.  
Inside the diner was the same color, cream for the entire wall and stripes with brown and pink; Of course, if I removed two stains from my fingers in brown, right behind the board with a basket full of fruits, set there to hide it. I didn’t have enough coordination to pick up a brush without getting dirty all over and everything around me and as the paints Thadou had bought were the bill, I had to steal one of my grandmother’s paintings to plug the hole. Basically, if you ignored the wrong theme, it was beautiful.  
The roundtables were useful for my “uncoordinated” duo partner not showing up with frequent purples, and the all-snack counter helped him keep his bills up and save time, as he liked it the most. it was to decorate ice cream. In the background, in front of the fryer with its messy brown hair and a boyish smile, was Thaddeus. He was about six years older than us, and yet he had the feat of appearing to be our age.  
The smell of frying washed over the place as we drove deeper into the diner, past the busy tables, toward the one we always sat on, closest to the window, by Luana’s choice, and closer to the ice cream and away from the bars. Drumsticks, at Rafael’s insistence. This made your diet easier.  
“Boys!”  
Thaddeus walked around the fast counter and reached for one by one to touch his hand, then turned to my friend.  
" Ms.” He made a typical gentleman’s hand gesture. “Will they want the menu or…”  
“Same as always,” I said with a smile.  
He gave a smile that hid his eyes. It had become commonplace for Thaddeus to offer us the menu just out of habit, because we literally always asked for the same thing, unless we used their space just to talk.  
“The boy! Come here” the lady at the next table shouted, though it was unnecessary, and our friend hid his grimace with a smile before going to answer it.  
" Did you get the job done? Hector asked Luana, each sitting opposite me.  
" I got it hard, math is not my forte.“ He shrugged, she was very human.  
" What job?” I asked because as they both studied together, you couldn’t tell.  
" From Carlos. My part was very hard. ”He sighed with a frown.  
" Same as mine.”  
“Very difficult,” he repeated as if it were obvious, and I saw a good time there to try something.  
One morning at home, studying, I trying to explain to him all the subjects I would make a point of reviewing the night before. And she near me. I needed to know what was happening to me because it was confusing me, I wanted to be able to talk to her again without seeming to choke, and at any moment would fall hard on the floor in nervousness. I don’t know what happened to me, I wasn’t like that and wouldn’t accept to continue like this. Of course I was not liking my friend. Of course not, I didn’t even want to imagine the mess this would cause. It was just a phase.  
“I can give you some tutoring if you want,” he suggested, snapping me out of my thoughts.  
That was my talk.  
“ I help you Moon… with classes.”  
Rafa and Hector exchanged alternate glances, they seemed to be expecting it. Not even I was understanding what is with me and they were already suspecting something.  
“ I’m still free in the morning. “ Hector works.  
My unfortunate joblessness might help me. The boys’ gaze on me was making my throat dry.  
“It’s okay, boys.” She smiled, and so did I, involuntarily. “ I’ll watch several video lessons until the entrance exam.”  
“ I can send you some, I have a folder with several.”  
“Seriously?” She exclaimed excitedly.  
No, not at all.  
“Yes, I downloaded it last week.”  
No, I didn’t download it.  
“This week I spend at your house with the flash drive.”  
That! I had to download several video lessons on a lousy internet, but who cared? I managed to sound quite casual. I turned, and besides seeing Thaddae coming with our requests, I saw two pairs of very inquiring eyes.  
“You’re lying,” Rafael whispered, as Thaddeus exclaimed excitedly that the orders arrived.  
Maybe not that casual.  
“Hot dogs and chips for Caesar, drumstick for Luana, ice cream for Rafael, and chips for Heitor. That’s right?”  
“ Yes, man. Thanks” Rafael replied, already taking his two ice creams.  
“ Just need to call.”  
Ice cream was the only thing Rafa could not get out of his routine and Hector only asked for chips because he was the one he considered the healthiest of all industrialized options, as Thaddeus promised to change the oil whenever we arrived.  
“ How are you looking for a job? “ Hector asked me as soon as Thaddeus left to meet the others.  
“Pretty much, for now, no news.” I shrugged without hope. At least the work on my own helped for now.  
Beside me, Rafael choked, tapped the table and exclaimed happily, the coughs.  
“I forgot to tell, got a job!”  
“ Seriously?”  
The four of us shouted in unison, startling the lady who had once shouted at Thaddeus. Rafael was the second now to get a job and we couldn’t let that go blank.  
\- Thaddeus! Soda, Rafa got a job!  
We had already done this when Hector got his, as a helper in the small library of the city, six months ago, so Thaddeus first understood the message, throwing his hand in the air and exclaiming a “Yes.” Yes, our toast would be with soda.  
“Oh come on, Hector, just today,” Rafael muttered, handing him the glass with a wrinkled nose. “Even I’ll take.”  
“It’s bad, Rafa. Mainly for you. “According to Hector, that was undoubtedly the worst thing we could ingest.”  
“It’s just a cup.”  
It even seemed like we were having the most forbidden drink in the world.  
“Just today,” Thaddeus asked, smiling, pulling the chair beside him to sit and toast. “Rafa!”  
“The guy who will pay the bill today!”  
We raise the glass up and knock. “These young people,” the old lady murmured and shouted again for Thaddeus, needlessly, perhaps she was a little deaf like my neighbor. He took the contents of the glass in a second and ran to answer it.  
“Bring another ice cream!”  
I drank the soda watching Hector eagerly sipping his half-glass with difficulty, sip by sip, as if it were martyrdom. It amazed me. The scene was a miracle, because I didn’t remember the last time I saw Hector do it, not even when we had this same celebration he had taken. Beside me Luana shifted, searching for something in her pocket.  
“Moon?” I muttered.  
“I have to go.”  
Rafa’s head whipped around when he heard her speak.  
“Already?”  
“Yes, I’m sorry, Rafa. I need to help my aunt. My uncle Marcelo arrives this afternoon, she asked me to keep the dogs while she picks him up at the airport.”  
I had forgotten that, Marcelo, Luana’s uncle and his neighbor, had been traveling in England for a fortnight, fulfilling a teenage dream that had been interrupted with a pregnancy.  
“Fine. See you in the afternoon.”  
Luana hugged him, handing over the money to pay her share, Rafael firmly rejected which and ruffling each other’s hair, an act I hated as my gel-filled hair turned into a broom but only made my heart beat. stronger and my throat dried and took his bag.  
“Bye Thaddeus!”  
“Bye Miss Luana.”  
I followed her with my eyes as she opened the door and took her bicycle from the next room, which Thaddaus let use, since there were four bicycles always. I didn’t look around until the only thing I saw was the empty street.  
“ Spit it out.”  
It startled me, my two friends had stopped eating and were watching me.  
“Spit it out?”  
“You’re weird, weird,” Hector explained, and my throat went dry.  
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  
“So you are naturally stuttering, red as pepper and have something stuck in your throat?” Rafael looked astonished. What a son of a bitch.  
“Or just when you’re near Luana?” Another son of a bitch.  
I swallowed and my friends’ eyes twinkled in agreement. Ok, I was swallowing often these last times. I couldn’t talk to them, that would be to confirm that something was even more so, it would be the risk of making the mood a little embarrassing. I opened my mouth twice, wondering what excuse to tell and the opening of an anime rang. It was Rafael’s cell phone. Saved by the bell.  
He caught it, giving it an almost deadly look and answered it.  
“Speak up, Ben.”  
It was his neighbor, which gave me some time to get out, since conversations were usually well-rendered. I muttered a goodbye to Hector, who made a “will you run away?” Face and shrugged. I would go.  
I didn’t give my friends time to complain that I didn’t answer their questions and leave quickly, making sure I still had an interrogation to deal with later.


End file.
